WikiLeaks Releases

WikiLeaks, an organization dedicated to releasing and disseminating information, released 77,000 Afghan war diaries, 400,000 Iraq war logs, and 251,287 diplomatic cables, all of which are believed to have been obtained through Pfc. Bradley Manning, who copied them from the federal database onto a Lady Gaga CD.

After the third incident, dubbed "CableGate," Julian Assange was heavily scrutinized by many governments (while some minor governments offered him support- although neither Sweden nor Switzerland, the countries he viewed as safe, ultimately supported Assange) and, on Dec. 7, arrested in Britain over charges of nonconsensual unprotected sexual intercourse with two female Swedish WikiLeaks supporters.

Hacktivist group Anonymous soon unleashed a wave of cyberattacks against sites such as PayPal, MasterCard, and Amazon, which had denied WikiLeaks service.